James Bond hutia discovered on Hispaniola

A large rodent has been discovered in the Dominican Republic and has been named James Bond hutia. The Plagiodontia aedium bondi weighs more than two pounds and is threatened with extinction due to deforestation, as reported in the UK Daily Mail. The creature was found by a team of scientists led by the Zoological Society of London (ZSL). It was found to live in the south east of Haiti and the south west of the Dominican Republic.

“We named the hutia after James Bond because he originally identified a barrier in southern Haiti, now called Bond’s Line, which marks the boundary between the distribution of this hutia and its closest relatives, and which, we now know, used to be a shallow sea channel running across the island.

“I am glad we were able to describe James Bond’s hutia before it’s too late, as it is highly threatened by deforestation, even in protected areas,” said scientist Samuel Turvey.